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Trails watchmen are there to push mountain-bike agenda
Thank you for your article, Watchmen on Duty. What Mark Wood, who is a paid North Shore Mountain Bike Association employee, fails to mention is that...

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OTTAWA - A digital petition once famously forced the White House to provide official comment on an oddball suggestion for stimulating the U.S. economy: building a heavily armed intergalactic space station...

The judge in the Surrey Six trial has rejected an application by accused Cody Rae Haevischer to limit the Crown’s cross-examination of a potential witness.

The judge hearing the Surrey Six murder trial has rejected an application by accused Cody Rae Haevischer to limit the Crown’s cross-examination of a witness should he be called to testify.

Court heard that the witness, former Red Scorpions gang member Kenny Kao, was on the Crown’s witness list but was never called to testify by prosecutors, who have concluded their case.

Lawyers for Haevischer want to question Kao because he has evidence that they believe will undermine the credibility of former gang leader Michael Le, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit murder in connection with B.C.’s worst gangland slayings and who testified against the accused.

Kao also has told police that Haevischer’s co-accused Matthew Johnston confessed to him his involvement in the wake of the October 2007 fatal shootings of six men.

Haevischer’s lawyers applied to have B.C. Supreme Court Justice Catherine Wedge order that the Crown be prevented from questioning Kao about the Johnston confession if the defence calls him as a witness.

But in a ruling Wednesday, the judge denied the defence request, noting that Kao has evidence that is probative to the case and that any prejudice to the defence does not outweigh the probative value of the Johnston confession.

Crown counsel Mark Levitz told the judge that the defence is expected to tell the court on Monday whether they will call any evidence.

He said that if no evidence is called, the two sides can be ready to give final submissions by July 2. In that scenario, the submissions by Crown and defence would likely be finished by July 11, court heard.

Haevischer and Johnston have pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and first-degree murder.